How Food Packaging Influences Our Purchases

You mightn’t realise it, but packaging on food products, from colour all the way to font, can influence our decision to buy! Similar to how our appetite can influence our beauty purchases, labels on food are designed to grab our attention and ultimately convince us to buy them. 

Studies have shown that food packaging can affect our perception of not only the quality of food, but the taste too! It’s been shown that people will pay more based on packaging that is aesthetically pleasing. 

Packaging is like art, it can evoke positive emotions in us which can leads to a “bond” with a food product, leading us to repurchase.

Brightly coloured packaging draws attention and can be enough for us to want to purchase it. Simple packaging with fine font and a minimalist design can have us perceive food as being healthy! The same goes for the colour green – it’s a colour associated with health.

This extends to labels that use words like “fresh”, “natural”, or “organic” – those are words we perceive as healthy, but they’re more often than not just words! 

All we can do is take a moment to stop and think! Sometimes we buy out of loyalty, if we’ve used a product that we enjoy for a long time regardless of health benefits, we’re inclined to repurchase because we’ve got that “bond” with either the product or the brand itself.

Marketing works! First impressions count, and it’s easy to be led astray by choice words, visual appeal of packaging, and our subconscious brand loyalty. When shopping for healthy foods, try to separate the art from the quality of the food, and pay attention to the back of the label.